Despite I was a child when I watched it, I didn't manage to be scared. And I tried.
The opening sequence says all. There's this proper gentleman driving his dignified car along the highway, the sun shines in the sky and everything is jolly good when all of a sudden for no apparent reason he pulls out a kind of "evil" face, pushes the throttle down and starts driving like a madman.
Then he has an accident, obviously. A bit strange accident, truth be told. We see him squeezing his tyres from side to side for something like five minutes without hitting any other car and finally pulling down some cones and a wooden fence. This must be a serious accident in England though, because next thing he's struggling for his life in the emergency room.
Which is notable since his body shows no injuries and there isn't the smallest trace of blood round there. But this is only the beginning. During the surgery (don't ask me what kind of surgery, there were doctors doing stuff and yelling to each other) his heartbeat literally splits in two and becomes "double". I'm not kidding you. There are two different lines doing beep beep now on the monitor of the machinery whereas there was only one moments before. And nobody there seem to notice that.
Now, you would expect these unusual events being explained along the movie. I don't know, the devil, reincarnation, something.
No way.
You are only allowed to know that now there's a second Mr. Pelham in town, dating girls and driving sports cars dressed like a buffoon (Where does he sleep? Where does he get his money? Does he have a driving license to show to the police in case they stop him?).
We can understand this movie only if we consider it not a horror but a goofy social satire on middle-class dullness. An "American beauty" ante litteram. And even so...
I loved the very English background and the seventies atmosphere.
Not actually a movie, rather a good laugh.
8 out of 18 found this helpful